Technology brings the world together. Years ago computer programmers, doctors, teachers and any person in a field that would require information had stack of books on their desks, now we just need a computer connected to the internet. Thanks to the World Wide Web the amount of information is limitless. I am so mesmerized by all this new technology now available to students that was practically nonexistent when I last attended college. Technology has such an impact on our daily lives. A clever way to build a Personal Knowledge Base (PKB) is by using the application called Evernote. Evernote allows users to organize knowledge, ideas and important information in one location with accessibility from any device, anywhere and at any time. I consider it a blessing to have been introduced to Evernote during my first semester of graduate school. However, due to the overwhelming amount of work required by the other science graduate course and this course, and the duration of both courses, I did not truly research all of what Evernote has to offer to students.
There is no doubt that evernote can help any student become a better learner especially that an important aspect of being a great student is having great organizational skills, thus wasting as little time as possible. Having the opportunity to keep your notes and additional course references- from your own research or those given by your professors in one place is quite a powerful tool. Another feature that I truly like about Evernote is reducing the use of paper. Here are the few ways I use Evernote and web clipper to support my work in both this course and my clinical biochemistry course.
It took me a while to remember to take class notes using Evernote, I guess habits are difficult to break. I caught myself taking out my notebook before class would start; I felt like the new kid on the block, learning new ways to do things in this new technological era. Using Evernote I also created another notebook titled projects. All of the research material I collected for the context project was stored in this notebook. This is where the web clipper became quite handy. With just one click I was able to clip part or a whole document. Before Evernote, I would create bookmarks as a way to store articles. Due to the fast-paced nature of both of my summer courses, another feature that I find quite helpful is the reminder feature. I did not quite master it yet but according to Evernote it is a promising feature. “With Reminders you get three great features all rolled into one: alarms, note based to-dos and the ability to pin notes to the top of your note list” (Sinkov, 2013). As I learn more about Evernote, this is one feature that would be quite useful to me.
Since I am still not comfortable using Evernote, I have not developed any other uses other than the basics such as using web clipper. I am quite fascinated with this feature. I am storing all my educational and science journal clippings in two separate folders, one is titled educational journals and the other one is science journals. Here I am collecting quotes, and short text sections or whole research articles. I was interested to find out whether or not science teachers are using Evernote and if so, how? Quite a few science teachers are already using Evernote in their classrooms. Here are some examples of the ways in which Evernote is being utilized: Kevin Buran, science teacher at Carmel Middle School, uses it to share information with his students. He indicates that Evernote’s Shared Notebooks is a simple way for students to have access to class notes, worksheets, Power Points, articles and labs. Students, especially students who missed class, can access it through a link or via Moodle, a service that his school district has incorporated. He scans student work that he finds exemplary. He also had his 8th grade class sign up for an Evernote account to help them do research. He takes snap photos of the daily itinerary he writes on the whiteboard. Again students that are not in class, benefit from this. He saves video links and articles to Evernote so that his students can see how the content they are learning relate to the real world. Another interesting statement he made is that his school like many other schools is considering going to a 1:1 model – “incorporating technology into classroom in a more integrated way.” He says, “the fact that Evernote can be accessed from virtually any device and syncs across devices means that no matter what technology we choose, teachers and students can continue to access all of their notes from anywhere they happen to be “ (Buran, 2011). Amanda Ooten, an AP biology teacher, is excited to use Evernote in her class especially that her class is more project and inquiry based and a 1:1 environment is suitable for this type of curriculum. Her students were able to link their learning with data. She is also excited that this would also reduce the paper cost. She also uses Google Docs in her classroom. Her students use Evernote to digitally organize, share and submit assignments. Her students use Google Docs when the assignment requires collaboration and later students just link it to their Evernote account when it is completed. The students submit their assignments to her via Google Form that links her to the Google Doc or Evernote. Another bonus of using Evernote in her classroom is that it allows her to have a digital portfolio of her students work. It also allows her to reflect on all the steps of the learning process. Educators also use Evernote to digitally organize notes taken, scanned worksheets and labs they gathered during professional development. Based on these examples, I can infer that Evernote is already a feature component of future learning.
As I mentioned early, the way I organized my PKB is quite simple. I created 4 major tags: Teaching, URI Grad School, Science Journals and Educational Journals. Under URI Grad School, I created two sub tags: EDC 503 and BCH 551. Under each course I created my notebooks: class notes, audio notes, study guides, group projects and book notes. Since I have limited time to discover new features and/or watch tutorials I have not yet discovered any use for note links. However, I am already thinking in other ways that I will use it next school year. While I am working towards my master degree in Biotechnology, I substitute for the school district of Warwick. Since I started substituting, I carry with me a notebook were I would jot down ideas, strategies or interesting labs that I see other science teachers use. Sometimes I like the way they organize their classroom, so now I can take a picture, scan labs and worksheets that I like and all of these I can organize in one folder and if I ever have the opportunity to teach again, I would have all of these in one location and not try to remember where I stored a specific lab or worksheet. I am quite excited about that, means less clutter and better efficiency.
Finally, here are ways that Evernote would help me augment my current thinking: The amount of information that I am required to learn in my current science courses is overwhelming, so the method that I used to be more efficient is to create a study guide and flashcards, so I would carry my flashcards everywhere I would go- while waiting to eat at a restaurant, while waiting to see my dog’s vet…practically any where I would go and knew I would be waiting my flashcards would go with me. This was before Evernote, now that I discovered the app “Evernote Peek” I am super excited to be able to use it. According to Andrew Sinkov, Evernote Peek turns notes, audio and images in Evernote into study materials. “Creating new study material is easy. All you need to do is make a notebook in Evernote. The titles of the notes will become the clues and the body of the notes will become the answers…sync Evernote with Peek…the notebooks will appear ready for studying “ (Sinkov, 2011). Evernote Peek is one study strategy I will definitely use in all of my science graduate courses. Evernote will also allow me to be a better researcher. As I get further into graduate school, both Evernote and Zotero will become extremely valuable tools.
I am also glad that I was introduced to Wikipedia as well. When I was a teacher, I created a webpage for my class with ClassJump. Unlike Wikipedia, it does not address the idea of going paperless. Wikipedia also seems to be relatively easy for students to use. Another tool that I was introduced to in this course, is Google Doc, which I am so excited about. These are the valuable tools that will definitely enhance my academic life as I go through graduate school and beyond.
Evernote is one great component of future learning. Students and teachers can utilize it. What makes Evernote so useful – teachers can attach worksheets, PowerPoint, animations and pretty much everything they will need to teach a lesson. This is also a great way for educators to share their ideas with their colleagues. Evernote is useful for students because they can keep all their school content digitally organized, thus reducing the opportunity to lose things and having it available in any device. They can also link their learning with data, hence expand their knowledge and become more independent learners. I have used it for a short time, but I am finding it more and more useful as I learn more about it. It is becoming my knowledge treasure box; everything that I need to remember or would need to refer back to is digitally organized. The possibilities are endless. It is up to the user to find them.
References:
Sinkov, A. (2013). Reminders Now Available on Windows Phone. Evernote Blog
Buran, K. (2011). Teaching with Evernote: A 6th and 8th Grade Science Teacher Shares His Top Tips. Evernote Blog
There is no doubt that evernote can help any student become a better learner especially that an important aspect of being a great student is having great organizational skills, thus wasting as little time as possible. Having the opportunity to keep your notes and additional course references- from your own research or those given by your professors in one place is quite a powerful tool. Another feature that I truly like about Evernote is reducing the use of paper. Here are the few ways I use Evernote and web clipper to support my work in both this course and my clinical biochemistry course.
It took me a while to remember to take class notes using Evernote, I guess habits are difficult to break. I caught myself taking out my notebook before class would start; I felt like the new kid on the block, learning new ways to do things in this new technological era. Using Evernote I also created another notebook titled projects. All of the research material I collected for the context project was stored in this notebook. This is where the web clipper became quite handy. With just one click I was able to clip part or a whole document. Before Evernote, I would create bookmarks as a way to store articles. Due to the fast-paced nature of both of my summer courses, another feature that I find quite helpful is the reminder feature. I did not quite master it yet but according to Evernote it is a promising feature. “With Reminders you get three great features all rolled into one: alarms, note based to-dos and the ability to pin notes to the top of your note list” (Sinkov, 2013). As I learn more about Evernote, this is one feature that would be quite useful to me.
Since I am still not comfortable using Evernote, I have not developed any other uses other than the basics such as using web clipper. I am quite fascinated with this feature. I am storing all my educational and science journal clippings in two separate folders, one is titled educational journals and the other one is science journals. Here I am collecting quotes, and short text sections or whole research articles. I was interested to find out whether or not science teachers are using Evernote and if so, how? Quite a few science teachers are already using Evernote in their classrooms. Here are some examples of the ways in which Evernote is being utilized: Kevin Buran, science teacher at Carmel Middle School, uses it to share information with his students. He indicates that Evernote’s Shared Notebooks is a simple way for students to have access to class notes, worksheets, Power Points, articles and labs. Students, especially students who missed class, can access it through a link or via Moodle, a service that his school district has incorporated. He scans student work that he finds exemplary. He also had his 8th grade class sign up for an Evernote account to help them do research. He takes snap photos of the daily itinerary he writes on the whiteboard. Again students that are not in class, benefit from this. He saves video links and articles to Evernote so that his students can see how the content they are learning relate to the real world. Another interesting statement he made is that his school like many other schools is considering going to a 1:1 model – “incorporating technology into classroom in a more integrated way.” He says, “the fact that Evernote can be accessed from virtually any device and syncs across devices means that no matter what technology we choose, teachers and students can continue to access all of their notes from anywhere they happen to be “ (Buran, 2011). Amanda Ooten, an AP biology teacher, is excited to use Evernote in her class especially that her class is more project and inquiry based and a 1:1 environment is suitable for this type of curriculum. Her students were able to link their learning with data. She is also excited that this would also reduce the paper cost. She also uses Google Docs in her classroom. Her students use Evernote to digitally organize, share and submit assignments. Her students use Google Docs when the assignment requires collaboration and later students just link it to their Evernote account when it is completed. The students submit their assignments to her via Google Form that links her to the Google Doc or Evernote. Another bonus of using Evernote in her classroom is that it allows her to have a digital portfolio of her students work. It also allows her to reflect on all the steps of the learning process. Educators also use Evernote to digitally organize notes taken, scanned worksheets and labs they gathered during professional development. Based on these examples, I can infer that Evernote is already a feature component of future learning.
As I mentioned early, the way I organized my PKB is quite simple. I created 4 major tags: Teaching, URI Grad School, Science Journals and Educational Journals. Under URI Grad School, I created two sub tags: EDC 503 and BCH 551. Under each course I created my notebooks: class notes, audio notes, study guides, group projects and book notes. Since I have limited time to discover new features and/or watch tutorials I have not yet discovered any use for note links. However, I am already thinking in other ways that I will use it next school year. While I am working towards my master degree in Biotechnology, I substitute for the school district of Warwick. Since I started substituting, I carry with me a notebook were I would jot down ideas, strategies or interesting labs that I see other science teachers use. Sometimes I like the way they organize their classroom, so now I can take a picture, scan labs and worksheets that I like and all of these I can organize in one folder and if I ever have the opportunity to teach again, I would have all of these in one location and not try to remember where I stored a specific lab or worksheet. I am quite excited about that, means less clutter and better efficiency.
Finally, here are ways that Evernote would help me augment my current thinking: The amount of information that I am required to learn in my current science courses is overwhelming, so the method that I used to be more efficient is to create a study guide and flashcards, so I would carry my flashcards everywhere I would go- while waiting to eat at a restaurant, while waiting to see my dog’s vet…practically any where I would go and knew I would be waiting my flashcards would go with me. This was before Evernote, now that I discovered the app “Evernote Peek” I am super excited to be able to use it. According to Andrew Sinkov, Evernote Peek turns notes, audio and images in Evernote into study materials. “Creating new study material is easy. All you need to do is make a notebook in Evernote. The titles of the notes will become the clues and the body of the notes will become the answers…sync Evernote with Peek…the notebooks will appear ready for studying “ (Sinkov, 2011). Evernote Peek is one study strategy I will definitely use in all of my science graduate courses. Evernote will also allow me to be a better researcher. As I get further into graduate school, both Evernote and Zotero will become extremely valuable tools.
I am also glad that I was introduced to Wikipedia as well. When I was a teacher, I created a webpage for my class with ClassJump. Unlike Wikipedia, it does not address the idea of going paperless. Wikipedia also seems to be relatively easy for students to use. Another tool that I was introduced to in this course, is Google Doc, which I am so excited about. These are the valuable tools that will definitely enhance my academic life as I go through graduate school and beyond.
Evernote is one great component of future learning. Students and teachers can utilize it. What makes Evernote so useful – teachers can attach worksheets, PowerPoint, animations and pretty much everything they will need to teach a lesson. This is also a great way for educators to share their ideas with their colleagues. Evernote is useful for students because they can keep all their school content digitally organized, thus reducing the opportunity to lose things and having it available in any device. They can also link their learning with data, hence expand their knowledge and become more independent learners. I have used it for a short time, but I am finding it more and more useful as I learn more about it. It is becoming my knowledge treasure box; everything that I need to remember or would need to refer back to is digitally organized. The possibilities are endless. It is up to the user to find them.
References:
Sinkov, A. (2013). Reminders Now Available on Windows Phone. Evernote Blog
Buran, K. (2011). Teaching with Evernote: A 6th and 8th Grade Science Teacher Shares His Top Tips. Evernote Blog
Ooten, A. (2012). Embarking on 1:1 Pilot with Evernote. Science Teaching for the Future
Sinkov, A. (2011). Evernote Peek. Evernote Blog